Moderate [Kaine], picked as Dems' voice, faces liberal outcry

[deadparrot]

WASHINGTON — Virginia Gov. Timothy Kaine lifted the Democratic Party's spirits last fall when he won in a conservative state and gave his fellow Democrats some ideas about how to replicate his success.

The fruits of victory include the honor of being picked to respond to President Bush's State of the Union address Tuesday — and the wrath of liberal bloggers wondering why Democrats didn't choose somebody else. Anybody else.

On the campaign trail, Kaine was "not at all bashful about talking about faith and values," as he puts it, or about contrasting the successes of his state's popular Democratic leaders with the record of the Republican president and Congress.

He set "a leadership example for the rest of the country," Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said when they named Kaine to give the party response on national TV.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2006-01-25-kaine_x.htm

[aquart]

1. Still clinging to the mythical middle.

[Tom Joad]

2. He will talk about management. Like the only problem is we got a bad CEO.

He will probably insist that Bush has mismanaged Iraq. He will not say it is a crime. He will not insist we should end the occupation. He will probably say it should be "managed better". He will also say "God" often. Maybe mention the flag too.

No wonder the Dems aren't getting much traction from bush's problems and all the rest.

I do think it is not a matter of trying to capture the middle, but holding on to funders who come from the wealthy class. (hey, not accusing the dems of taking illegal donations, just saying that the overwhelming majority of cash comes from the wealthy, even when it is legal donations.)

[leftstreet]

3. Yes, corporate-speak. It'll be like getting 20 copies of the same memo.

They should have gone with Murtha.

x(

[wiley]

4. It's pretty obvious

that someone or group in the DNC has had a real light bulb of an idea.

[Moochy]

5. "wrath of liberal bloggers"

Them liberal bloggers. We are oh so scary. Fear our wrath.

[0rganism]

6. Does anyone besides the base watch the Democratic response?

Maybe the dismayed moderates will watch this year, all fifteen of them.

[expatriot]

8. It will be reported. every news story written/ran on the speech will

add "Democrats responded..." It frames the Democratic message. yes, it is very important.

[Meldread]

7. The problem isn't talking about faith and values...

...the problem is that the type of faith and values talked about are not shared.

I do not know why the media seems to think the right has some type of monopoly on values, because personally every value that I've ever seen them talk about does not match with their actions or is a value that no good natured person would share.

Case in point: Family Values

The right say they value families, yet they constantly do all that they can to undermine a woman's role in a heterosexual relationship, insisting that a man should be the head of the house instead of it being a partnership. They constantly seek to cause strife between family members with gay relatives, not to mention actively ripping apart gay families. They screw with Medicare and Medicaid that in turn harms people's parents and grandparents, and the list can go on.

They say they value life, yet they actively support the death penalty and actively undermine gun control.

They say they have Christian values, yet where in the Bible does Jesus advocate violence - let alone war? It seems some of them are forgetting one of those little commandments they want to stick up everywhere: Thou shall not kill.

...and the list can go on and on.

Values, to the right, is nothing more than a buzz word. The values they profess to have are an illusion or are values that only someone with either no heart or someone who is completely amoral could share.

[expatriot]

9. you nailed it. exactomundo. i am an atheist and would have no problem

with a Democrat who held revivals every place he went as long as he saved the bread and butter from Bush.

[xchrom]

10. ding! ding! ding!

winner!

this is the problem with moderating what is essentially a radical message.

and that's what moderate dems do for repukes -- soften their message for them.

why do we want to present the repuke message as less than radical than it really is?

[JudyM]

12. Well put! n/t

[LostinVA]

14. Kaine is also very anti death penalty

And he and his wife have always given alot to -- and for -- the community. I don't agree with him on everything, but he is less moderate and more liberal than many, many dems in Congress... he is also for gay rights. I don't have much of a problem with him. He is at least a good man.

[SaveElmer]

18. Kaine has a problem on Gay rights...

He opposes both gay marriage and civil unions, and just signed on to a bill to allow a referendum to write a ban on both into the Virginia constitution... He does support upholding contractual arrangements between couples, and has opposed some of the more odious restrictions the righties in the house of delegates have proposed.

Being a Virginia resident who voted for Kaine I am pretty disappointed in this. Hopefully we can turn him around on the issues over the next 4 years. He is basically a decent guy who I think is making a wrong decision on this particular issue.

Having said that, I have no problem with him giving the response. This is the kind of Democrat that can win in red states, and on most issues he sides with the party.

[nevergiveup]

11. Perhaps

we should wait and hear his response before we start jumping off bridges.

[jarab]

13. Yeah, I'll wait ...

I also would suspect that Kaine is closer to the heart of today's Democratic Party than is DU.
Face it! We're not going to have a true liberal give the response .. or for that matter be our candidate for President. It's - extreme leftism - not a winner in today's climate.
Howard Dean is the closest we could come, and he was slaughtered (correct word) in '04. Now, we have Dean in a position where we wish he'd cause little or less harm - and we cringe each time he makes a statement for the party.
Perhaps Chavez could be talked into giving our response. DU would be thrilled.
What the F could the Dem party do to please us? Filibuster everybody, do away with the armed forces, crown Sheehan as Queen, elevate PETA to cabinet status?
Give the man a F****ing chance! Sheesh!

...O...

[Pithy Cherub]

15. Kaine a moderate who will speak in milquetoast modest tones,

while mollycoddling the myopic mythical middle, and lauding middle management for ensuring momentum is confined to a minimum. When these desperate times call for a historic, passionate and eloquent inspirational elevation and articulation on national security - the Democratic leadership proudly presents: Newbie Gov, Super Boring Middle of the Road Guy.

Knock knock, anybody home in Dem Ville? :shrug:

[PeterSullivan2006]

16. Kaine is a good choice

You haven't seen Kaine when he's on his game.

No, he's not a Dean-style flamethrower, but he speaks with genuine passion and genuine compassion. I find him to be a very likeable, very appealing guy who can help us where we are weak. He's a former missionary, represented an inner-city district on the Richmond city council, and can bridge a lot of gaps between progressives and folks who aren't as politically active.

[Joe Chi Minh]

17. Bingo! I don't know anything about the guy that is not revealed

in this thread header, but you may be sure that the public trusts a former missionary representing an inner-city district on the city council, more than any "anything goes" liberal - and with very good reason. "Hey! Let's have just the legal system to decide what's right and what's wrong!", is their cry, evidently unaware that the primary purpose of the law is and always has been for the maintenance of society in a state stable enough for the purposes of the governing economic elite.

Today, that can mean the biggest villains at worst staying in country-club prisons, and more commonly perhaps, their licence to defraud and rob the public with virtually total impunity. And as for morality, which some atheists still acknowledge as something more than the freedom of Lucifer, well, let's just say, "Don't look to the generality of worldings for a lead in matters moral and spiritual".

Ever since the UK Labour party was taken over by atheist Socialists it's gone down hill. The successful ones are crooks, who have turned the country into a corporatist State, and the rest are no hopers whose only real interest in economic justice, is in obtaining as profitable a ride on the political gravy train for themselves as they can manage.

Historically, in both our countries, the loyalty of the atheist Socialist leadership has, with very few exceptions, been very short-lived. Once they move up the ladder, it's the soldiers' farewell. The long roll-call of shame of erstwhile left-wing fire-brands includes Thatcher's father, a Socialist councillor, Reagan, Tebbit aka the semi house-trained pole-cat and an erstwhile pilots' union representative, Blair (whose grand-parents were Communist trade-union leaders in the Glasgow shipyards), Reid, Healey, and plenty of other ex-Communist Cabinet Ministers, past and present.